Bere Regis Village Website

Bere Regis 1851 Census


The 1851 Census for England was taken on the night of 30 March 1851.
The following information was requested:

" Name of street, place, road, etc.
" House number or name
" Name of each person that had spent the night in that household
" Relationship of person enumerated to the head of the family
" Person's marital status
" Age at last birthday (sex is indicated by which column the age is recorded in)
" Person's rank, profession, or occupation
" Person's place of birth (if outside of England or Wales, only the country may be given)
" Whether blind, deaf, or an idiot
Enumeration forms were distributed to all households a couple of days before census night and the complete forms were collected the next day.
All responses were to reflect the individual's status as of 30 March 1851 for all individuals who had spent the night in the house. People who were travelling or living abroad were enumerated at the location where they spent the night on census night.
All of the details from the individual forms were later sorted and copied into enumerators' books, which are the records we can view images of today.
The original householders schedules from 1841 to 1901 were destroyed.

Census records are divided into groups by county, then by parish, and in many cases, such as in Bere Regis, by Enumeration districts as well.
An enumeration district was considered to be roughly equivalent to the area that a census worker or "enumerator" could cover in one day.

Our village was split into 3 Enumeration districts.


The files are all included in one VERY LARGE PDF file

Enumeration District A

Covers Main Village streets, Court Farm, Roke Barn, Bere Down, Butt Lane, Tower Hill, Snow Hill, Woodbury Hill & Bere Wood.


Enumeration District B

Covers Bere Heath, Southbrook, Rye Hill to thesouth of Chalk Pit Farm, Doddings, Jenkins, Culeaze, Higher Stockley, Lower Stockley, Philliols Farm, Higher Hyde & Hyde Lodge.

Enumeration District C

Covers Shitterton, Rye Hill from Vincents Building to Chalk Pit Farm, Chamberlains Mill & Chamberlains Farm.

Enumeration District D

One Area, Shitterton, has been transcribed from the Scans - you can see it by clicking the link here.